When I Wake
by The Darkest Skye
Summary: It's Cammie's fault this happened. She left us-she let us hit rock bottom. That's Zach and I couldn't sleep that night. And so I refuse to feel bad for what happened that night... /Zex (Series of One-shots set between OGSY and OSOT)
1. When I Wake

**THE GALLAGHER GIRL SERIES BELONGS TO ALLY CARTER AND ALLY CARTER ALONE. THIS IS ****_NOT_**** MINE.**

* * *

My eyes snap open.

_This can't be real. _My mind snaps at me. _She can't be gone._ But she is.

It's taken me this long to realize it, but this isn't seventh bloody grade anymore. Those stone walls won't always be here to protect us. They certainly aren't protecting Cammie right now.

Wherever she went, Cammie had better stay there, because when she gets back, I very well may kill her for making us worry. It's been ninety-two days since she disappeared, gone in the night. No good-bye, no clues, she's on her own.

She should've taken back up.

Hell—why didn't I know she was leaving?!

Slowly, I slide out of bed and onto my feet. The floor is cold against my feet as I pad over to the door and stand silently, listening. I can hear three different people snoring, so I slide open my door and step out into the hallway. For a second, my mind betrays me and I wonder if this was how Cammie felt.

When she left, I mean.

But unlike her, all I want is a drink of water from the kitchen. I don't like to wake people, so I am silent as I trudge down the stairs. I feel like I am years older after only three months of her being gone.

Could I do it? If I was in Cammie's position, could I leave without telling anyone?

The answer sends a chill up my spine as I realize something: Yes. Yes I could.

But would I?

Yes.

That has no implications that I can't still be mad at her though. She shouldn't have left. Not without taking us with her.

"You're awake early." Zach steps into the kitchen. He looks tired. But then again, since Cammie left, he's always looked tired.

I look at his messed up hair, weary eyes, and dejected expression. He doesn't sleep much these days. None of us do. "I could say the same to you. Couldn't sleep?"

"Not until I know she's safe."

This is an answer I understand. He has nowhere to go, Cammie was all he truly had. This summer, we're keeping an eye on him, but Zach's never been the most stable person around. Some days I just wish he would smile again. I wish he would smile at _me…._

I snap the thought back into my mind. No. I can't think those things about Zach. He is Cammie's. He's not mine. He never will be mine.

For now, at this hour of the night—morning, whatever—I can blame it on my grief and that Zach stands before me shirtless. His muscles look lean and damn sexy as he walks past me. He pours a cup of juice from the fridge and holds it out to me. Gingerly, I take it, prying my eyes off his biceps.

"Put a shirt on, Zach." I say after taking a long swig of the sweet liquid.

"Huh?"

"A shirt." I repeat. Then stammer out the rest of the sentence. "It's… _distracting_ when you walk around without one."

For a second, he looks dazed, then he smirks. That cocky, sexy smirk no one's seen since the beginning of summer. I force my heart to not race. "Why else would I do it?" he winks.

Oh. My. Bloody. God.

He winked.

At me.

"Screw you." I mutter, laughing gently, keeping my voice from faltering.

"What was that about wanting to screw me?" he asks, hopping up to sit on the counter beside me. I haven't seen him this…. _alive_. Not recently.

I grin at him, thankful that my blush is concealed by not only the lighting, but the dark cocoa of my skin. My thoughts couldn't show through it. He couldn't know what I was thinking.

"You're cute when you're being snide." I cross my arms.

He furrows his eyebrows. "Don't call me cute, _Rebecca_. An offence like that could make me lose my man card." His eyes show the playfulness I've missed so much.

For a moment, I feel like Macey. Flirting is her defense. She can't get hurt just from flirting. Only an insane guy wouldn't flirt back. So for now, I allow myself to flirt with Zach. For just a moment, I forget that Cammie's missing and I lose my worries when I flirt with Zach.

"You'll lose your man card faster if you keep calling me Rebecca. I very well may beat you up and take it for myself." I tease.

Then, I freeze when I suddenly feel his breath against my skin and his lips brush my ear. "I'd like to see you try, Baxter." He tells me.

That is all it takes for my breathing to catch and my eyes to squeeze shut, thinking of the _wrong_ kind of 'beating' him up. He had to have noticed that. I am about to say something snappy when suddenly I feel his lips brush my jaw line.

I don't move. This has to be my imagination. It _has_ to be.

But, no. I feel his lips again, this time on my cheek. And again, at the corner of my mouth. Finally, his lips gently brush mine, but I find myself needing more.

I press myself into his kiss. It's not gentle or sweet, this is hunger. He needs to be kissed, and I need to be held. This is how we deal with Cammie's disappearance. She left us.

She brought this upon herself.

His arms wrap around me and pull me onto his lap. My fingers lace through his hair. I feel his tongue sweep across my lower lip asking for entrance, but I don't give it to him. So, he starts trailing kisses down the side of my neck, nipping every here and there until he reaches my sweet spot.

My mouth opens as I try to conceal a moan and suddenly his lips are capturing mine again, pushing his tongue in. I try not to laugh—that would wake my parents and I _really_ don't need them walking in on this. He's won. Zach always knows how to beat me.

His hands trail down my sides and I notice just how well they mold to the curve of my hips. I swing my leg around so that I'm straddling his hips try to close whatever gap is still left between us.

When the opportunity comes, I lightly bite his lower lip and his arms tighten around me.

Something about the way he kisses me. It's not possessive, it's definitely not sweet, it's so primal. We both know that tomorrow—later this morning, _whatever_—we'll wake up and this won't matter. For just this moment, nothing does matter.

It's a stress reliever.

When he finally pulls away, my lips are bruised and he's breathing heavy. I avoid looking into his eyes. I don't want to know what he's thinking. Instead, I busy myself running my hands across his chest. There's so much muscle. So much brute force inside of him.

I don't know how he didn't crush me when we were kissing.

"I-I think I might be able to sleep…" Zach starts, but I sense that there's more, so I remain where I am, captured by memorizing the defining lines of each individual ab he has. "I might be able to… if you slept with me. _Not_ like that. But, just like actual sleeping. No clothing comes off. I just need something to hold onto."

Never before have I heard him stutter, but he does now.

Finally, I look into his eyes and see the pain that he's been hiding for so long. All he really needs is something to hold onto. _Someone_. So I nod and we settle in on the couch.

Zach's arm is protectively around my waist, my head rests in the crook of his neck. And we sleep. When I dream, there aren't any nightmares.

But when I wake, there will be. And this time, it will be real.

When I wake… Cammie will still be gone.

* * *

**D'aww... That was slightly cute. In my opinion at least. I've always had a thing for A Bex and Zach ship. Though, Zammie still prevails in my heart. RATE AND REVIEW PLEASE!(: ~The Darkest Skye**


	2. I promise

**As much as I hate to say it, I must again say that I do not own the Gallagher Girls, all rights to the characters go to Ally Carter. (:**

* * *

I bury my face in the crook of my pillow. For a few moments, I just breathe in and savor these short periods in which I have no worries and can simply _breathe_. My pillow radiates heat and I instinctively reach an arm around and try to pull it closer.

But the pillow lets out a low groan and a set of arms wrap around me. Suddenly, the groggy morning moments are over and I realize that my head is not on a pillow, it is on something way leaner and muscular than a pillow. I was sleeping with Zach.

The sensation of waking up in someone's arms is still odd and frankly, a bit off-putting, but I can't complain. I haven't had a nightmare once in the eighteen nights I've been spooned up against Zach.

For a moment, I try to pretend that this is not something new. I try to not remember why I wake up every morning tracing my fingers lightly across Zachary Goode's well sculpted abs. And yet, every morning I do. Cammie is still missing, and maybe she always will be.

It has been seventy days now since the Operative was last seen and sixty-nine since I decided that the next time I see her, I may kill her for making me worry so bloody much.

Zach rolls onto his side to be able to look me in the eyes. "Good morning, Bex," he tries to make it sound like he's used to this, but I can tell from the look in his eyes that he is not. Sometimes, when we sleep, I can hear him mumble Cammie's name as he grips me tighter. Great to know that I'm simply a replacement for his girlfriend.

Which, evidently, I did. Zach and I's sleeping together has just been a way to fall asleep. No clothes come off, nothing is aroused, we just lay down and sleep. Sometimes you just need something to hold onto.

I needed Zach, and he needed me.

I don't consider it betraying Cammie. In fact, anything that I try not to feel for Zach I blame on Cammie. She's the one who left. Cammie is the one who ran.

Cammie is the one who ran and didn't take us with her.

So, I listlessly mumble back, "Morning Zach."

He studies me for a second, presumably attempting to figure out why I am not reacting as I usually do to waking up beside him. I guess he comes to the conclusion that I'm overly stressed out, because the next thing I know, his lips have found my own and he's pulling me against him.

If I'd have been standing at the moment, my knees probably would've given out. Throughout my grief and fright and stress, Zach has been the only thing to keep me anchored. His kiss is sweet, unlike most of the times he kisses me. This kiss is not for him, no, this kiss is different. This kiss is for me.

But it feels more like it's for Cammie and so I pull away.

Zach cocks an eyebrow at me. I've never pulled away before. He's always the one who must pull away from me. For a moment, I stare at him, unwilling to look away.

Then I kiss him, just the way I like it. Primitive. This way no feelings can surface. This way when Cammie returns—_if_ she returns—I will feel no emotional attachment to Zach. I allow myself to be a lot of things, but I refuse to steal Zach away from Cammie. Only a bad friend would do that.

But this is coming from the girl who is currently playing tonsil tennis with her best friend's boyfriend in bed. And damn, I won't lie, it feels good.

I only feel alive when I'm kissing Zach these days. So I allow myself to roll on top of him and straddle my knees at his waist.

Whatever tension I'd built up already this morning disappears and all I know is that I am kissing Zach.

His hands trace down my waist as I nip at his lip. We've grown accustom to each other in this manner. This is purely a stress reliever. A way to try to forget that my best friend and his girlfriend is out in the world alone and perhaps even dead.

Zach's forearm goes around my waist and he pulls me close, fitting me perfectly against him before rolling to his side, pulling back and getting out of bed.

My parents were called on an assignment, so for now, it's just me and Zach in the house, supposedly getting ready to go back to school tomorrow.

Zach's coming too. The trustees agreed to let him go to Gallagher full time. I guess there's nowhere else he can go.

I straighten out my tank top and stand up too. Zach's hovers over his already half-packed bags, breathing heavy and pulling out a pair of jeans. "Do _not_ tell me you're planning on spending the day without a shirt on." I roll me eyes at him, but he simply shrugs.

"Hey, the parental units cleared out. No one here to tell me to put a shirt on." Zach smirks at me with his signature look.

I giggle in a totally un-Bexlike manor, retorting, "Since when did you take a liking to Team Jacob?"

"I did not," he tells me, changing out of his pajama bottoms as I pull my hair back into a ponytail. "You yourself should know I don't swing that way."

Winking, I respond, "Hey, you kiss me, doesn't exactly mean that you have to enjoy it."

Zach balls up his blue pajama bottoms and chucks them playfully at me. I simply laugh and pick them back up off the ground. "Is this what guys do instead of chucking panties at severely attractive members of the opposite sex?"

"Or you know, what guys do when they're trying to change and a girl is practically drooling at them." Zach snaps.

"I do not _drool_, Zachary. I do, however, appreciate a good set of abs when I come across them. I mean, bloody hell, what do you to get them?" I ask, pulling yesterday's t-shirt on overtop of my tank top. Zach may have no problem flashing me his Batman boxers, but I still maintain a little decency in front of a guy who I know is not my other half.

He shrugs, "I had to have maintained something from my extensive training at Blackthorne. I honestly think that the only guy there who didn't have a six pack was Jonas."

I stand and the two of us walk out of the room together and down the hall to the kitchen_. Even his back is sexy. _Then I mentally slap myself for even letting that thought cross my mind.

Think of something different, I silently plead to myself, but the thought that pops up is not one that I wish to think of either. Still, the words tumble out of my lips, "We go back to school tomorrow." I state, and then realize how much of an idiotic statement that must have sounded like.

So, I revise it: "We go back to school tomorrow and Cammie is still gone."

Zach pauses with the fridge door open, staring blankly in. I should not have mentioned her. We were doing so well. We had been so close to normal and then I had to go and think.

My entire life I've been trained to remember and recall. I've been trained to think. But I can honestly say that I've never regretted those facts so much before. I can still see her, remember all Cammie's favorite movies and bands. I remember going through Josh's trash during sophomore year.

That's the problem. I _remember_. And so does Zach. We will never be able to forget about Cameron Ann Morgan. She will always be engraved into our memories and the person that we worry most about. Zach and I will never, _ever_ stop searching for her. To get her back, we would both crawl through the deepest pits in hell.

I don't touch Zach. Right now, we are both made of ice.

Zach just closes the refrigerator and crouches down to his knees, holding his head in his hands. It's as close to a fetal position as Zachary Goode is capable of assuming. "We go back to school tomorrow and she's still missing." He says distantly.

He's making me acknowledge it and I hate him for it. I hate that I have to say aloud, "What if she never comes back?"

"Just like her dad." Zach says. He looks like he's lost the will to go on, the will to fight.

I knew that he'd reached rock bottom already. Two weeks he'd been missing earlier this summer, but he'd come back. And that was when I knew that he'd hit his lowest, because that was when he first kissed me. No one resorts to something so desperate when they have not hit the bottom.

Damn, I wish I could fix this mess. I wish I could go out, grab Cammie from whatever dreamland she'd run off to when she decided to run away, and bring her back to him. I wish that everything would just go back to bloody normal.

Tired. I am so, so tired. I've spent too many days stressed out, worried, listening for any sign that Cammie is alive or dead. My body feels awkward and too small. I don't eat enough anymore, but I don't think any of us really do. Head Mistress Morgan has never been more stressed out and frantic.

She's lost both her husband and her daughter now.

All of our hope is as good as gone now. She said she'd be back by now. In her mission report, she'd _promised_ she'd be back by now.

I guess that was a lie.

I reach down and pull Zach to his feet. "Until we know that she is gone forever, promise me we will go on as if she is. No matter what we must give up."

He stares down at me. "Promise?" he asks.

Never before has Zach seemed so awkward in his own body. I hate to see the pain in his eyes and the disappointment as he stands in the kitchen and just stares at the table. This isn't the strong and sexy Zach I've gotten to know perhaps too well over summer break. No. This is the boy who knows that he has almost officially lost everyone he ever cared about.

So I place my hand gently on his cheek and whisper, "I promise."

Zach pulls me in close to him and buries his head in my neck. We don't kiss. There is nothing romantic about this moment. We have spent so much time worrying. So much time that we should have been able to laugh during.

But we couldn't. I am going to miss these days alone with Zach, though not for the reason anyone watching would think.

People who only saw us would think that I would be missing a lover. That we only had one summer together, and then we split off and never saw each other again, but that is not true. I am going to miss these days where I only had one thing to worry about and one person who was there for me at every second of the day.

I am going to miss the friend, not the hot and heavy make-out sessions with an extremely attractive teenage boy. Though, who could really blame me. I think any girl would be more than disappointed to stop the make-out sessions.

Well, as long as the make-out sessions weren't with their missing best friend's boyfriend. I'm just screwed up.

"She'll be back." I tell him, "And when she does, I'm going to murder her."

Zach raises an eyebrow at me, then gives that slow, sexy smirk. "I think I'd call that counterproductive, Baxter," he says. "And remember, you lay a finger on Cammie and I'll be the one doing the killing."

I laugh. "You think you could beat me, Goode? I'd like to see you try."

And that was all it took to raise our spirits again. Sometime laughing is the only thing you have left. Sometimes you have to believe what someone tells you.

So, I believe that when I get back to school, Cammie will be sitting on her dorm room bed, reading our newest Culture and Assimilation textbook, taking notes. I believe this because I believe that Cammie keeps her promises. She promised she'd be back. And I promise myself that she wasn't lying.

I don't touch Zach after that. I'm not sure I ever will again. Now it just feels like betraying a girl who's still watching. So I ignore anything I might feel for him and try to go back to normal life. But until Cammie comes back, it won't be normal. There will still be a hole in my life. Perhaps it will mend. Someday, sometime, somewhere, with someone, but today I do not think of that.

Today I promise myself that she will return, for that is all I have left.

A promise.

* * *

**So, I must admit, I'm kinda still deciding whether I prefer Zex or Zammie, but I feel like this is the only thing that ever could happen with Bex and Zach. They're both loyal and smart and trustworthy. But yeah. That's it for this I think. Though, I'm kinda formulating in my head a third chapter. Maybe if I get enough reviews...(: ~Skylar Marie**


	3. But They Won't

"Hey." The voice comes from behind me, but I don't turn around to greet the boy who it belongs to. I already know that he's standing there, propped up against the wall, scratching his head in a way that only he can make look sexy.

"Goode." I acknowledge him.

Neither of us move. I already know what he's going to say. _Don't say it. Please, god, don't let him say it._ I hate myself for thinking that. I hate him. I love him. I hate him. I…

I am in a disturbing stage of contradiction about how I feel about Zachary Goode. One second I'm considering kissing him, and the next, I'm about to punch him. I guess that's natural. He is my best friend's boyfriend-ish.

Technically, he's never asked her out, so I could call BS when she tried to accuse me of anything if I _did_ go for him, but I won't. I won't act on how I feel. I won't smile or be happy either. This is my punishment for letting me feel anything for Zach. I won't even let myself look at him.

Not even now, at what should be the happiest moment of my life.

"I already know." I tell him as coldly as I possibly can. This is who I am now, cold and detached. "If I didn't, I wouldn't be here."

Here happens to be a secluded corner of the mansion, not one of Cammie's favorite hiding spots, one of my own. I sit in a dead end of a second floor hallway of the mansion. There's a small side table here filled with fresh flowers, so I know that other people come here too, but it feels secluded.

My hands idly primp at the flowers, adjusting them to look better, pulling off dead petals. I don't know much about the care and handle of flowers, but I need to do something with my hands. I need to not do anything stupid.

I feel his presence a foot behind me. We haven't touched in twenty-seven days. I haven't looked at him in twenty-four.

I am polar north, and so is he. When you try to put the two together, they bounce off each other. Because of this, I cannot even look at lay my eyes on him, they bounce right off.

"We can't keep on like this, Bex," Zach says quietly. "She's scheduled to be back in forty-eight hours."

My body is rigid. For so long, I looked forward to this day, where I am told that Cammie is coming home, but not that it has arrived, I just wish it would bloody go away.

Every time I close my eyes, I'm back on the kitchen counter, feeling Zach's lips press against me for the first time, brushing my cheek. Every time I blink, Zach's arms are around me as I sleep. Every time I try to sleep, I imagine he's there, arms wrapped around me. I still hear the sound of his heartbeat some days, strong and steady.

But I don't look at him. I keep my body turned toward the flowers and eyes locked on the colorful petals. I don't think Liz or Macey have figured it out yet, how Zach and I spent our summer, and I pray they never will. I already have Cammie to worry about, I don't need Liz's southern rage or Macey to water-board me—which she would if she ever found out.

I can have any guy I want, snatch anyone off the streets of Roseville and Macey will shrug and say, "Whatever floats your boat," but Zach is completely, entirely, utterly off-limits.

And I broke that. I fell for him. Everything—that slow, sexy smirk, his sense of humor, even that fragile side. All of him. Not to mention that he's got a really sexy back, which most girls don't seem to understand, but come on, when they've got muscle—_shut up, Bex._

Okay, it's official, I have stooped to a new level of hating myself.

"What do you want me to do?" he asks. I can feel his gaze on my back. "Bex, I need you to tell me what to do, because I don't know what happened."

He's done it. No one thought it was possible, but Zach's done it. He's broken me. Not even Cammie managed to do that. The swagger from my voice and walk is gone, replaced simply by a girl who's working herself to death to make up for what she's done. What she will never be able to make up for.

"You bloody kissed me." I say listlessly. "That's what happened."

Behind me, Zach lets out a sigh and steps back. I know he's got a hand on his head. It's what he does when he's frustrated or confused. He spent most of the summer with a hand on the side of his head, pacing around, looking lost.

He spent last summer like that because of Cammie. Because he loves Cammie.

"Oh." Is all he says.

_Can't breathe. Need air_. But I don't let myself breathe. That would break the silence that we find ourselves in. I've taken a liking to silence. I like the complete peace, the thoughtlessness it provides.

Zach puts a hand on my forearm. "I'm sorry, Bex. I shouldn't ha—I mean, this summer was… Damn."

And the next thing I know, he's spun me around and pressed his lips to my own. It's soft and sweet and comforting. My arms go around his neck without my brain's permission. In fact, my brain pretty much shuts off. All that I know is that Zach taste so good and that I love the way he feels pressed up against me.

I close my eyes and press into the kiss, tangling my fingers in his hair and biting his lips.

Suddenly I'm back pinned against the wall and Zach is staring down at me, breathing hard. "I had to do that." he says.

I know the look he gives me. As a spy, I grew up in a world where a simple look means anything and everything. So, I know the look that he's giving me means goodbye. It means I'm sorry. It means I had to do that one last time.

So I soften my expression and hope he reads it as it originally meant: Don't go. I will never forgive you if you do.

I sink down to the ground, unintentionally dragging Zach with me. Even now, he won't leave me. We are still using each other as support. Zach is still my crutch. Perhaps he always will be.

"Hey," he whispers, putting his hands on either side of my face and kissing my forehead gently, "We'll figure it out, Bex. Maybe things'll sort themselves out when she gets back." But they won't—not when I feel like this.

Forcing a small smile, I nod. I do what I've spent my entire life training to do when I need to. I lie. "Yeah, they will. Thing will go back to normal."

If he picks up on the slight crack in my voice, he doesn't let on. Zach simply nods and quickly presses his lips to my own one last time before standing and starting back down the hall. I don't cry, that would be too cliché for me. So I simply stare after him, wishing he would come back, wishing I hadn't thought that.

When he reaches the end of the hall, Zach looks back at me. I know that look. It means I'm sorry that I love you. I know it means that because it's the look I see every time I'm in front of a mirror. That look means I'm gonna have to spend my entire life making it up to Cam for what we did this summer, for what's leftover.

So I stand and leave my hallway, taking a flower from the vase. Chances are I'll never be able to come back with a memory so strong still residing in it. I let out a sigh, frustrated and broken, but slowly mending.

Eventually I'll be able to look at Zach and feel nothing romantic. Eventually being the key word here.

Eventually means that I won't heal immediately. It means that I will have to suffer for a while before I can get better. But it also means that I will get better. It means that there's hope. And right now, I'm in desperate need of some hope.

Macey sits on her bed, staring at a copy of Vogue, Liz is studying her notes. This is their way of coping with the news that while Cammie is alive and coming back, she doesn't remember anything.

Macey looks up at me and smiles. It's hopeful and without thinking about it, I smile back at her. The goddess of boys knows nothing of my summer. She does not know that I am in love with our roommate's boyfriend.

Despite my own melodramatic recent life, Macey and Liz are my proof that life goes on.

"Where were you?" Macey asks as she sits up.

I shrug. "Talking to Zach." I won't lie to her, but I won't tell the whole truth.

She nods and looks back at her magazine, then stops and looks back up with a dangerously raised eyebrow. "Hey, Bex. Why are your lips swollen?"

Bloody hell.


	4. And It's Beautiful

I'm smiling. It's an odd sensation, but I'm smiling.

I shouldn't be smiling. At least, I shouldn't be smiling at Zach. I should be frowning. I should be scowling. I should be doing anything but outright grinning at Zachary Goode.

He stares down at me awkwardly as if it's been years since we spoke instead of fifteen days. We talk all the time these days about nothing, about everything. I don't think either of us know really what to say to Cammie. She still feels like a ghost roaming the school. A body, but not quite a soul. Not fully there. Not yet.

"We should talk." Zach tells me, grabbing me not so gently by the arm and dragging me into one of the unused classrooms. He looks worried, his dark eyebrows creased as he looks around to make sure the room is empty. I could have stopped him or stood my ground, but I don't. I still need him.

I force myself to laugh and make everything feel normal. "Ooh, Zach's gone all serious."

He narrows his eyes at me and sits me down on a desk quietly. I haven't seen him this serious since Cammie came back last week. She barely looks like herself, beat up, skin and bones, and black, short hair, but Zach couldn't be happier. She's alive. That's all that matters.

You can see it in his eyes. The hopelessness and worry is gone. He's back to his cocky self. "Look. I don't…" he pauses, looking around nervously as if this is a touchy subject. "I don't want you to encourage Cammie trying to ignite something to get her memory back."

My eyebrows crease. "What? Don't you want to know what she found out?"

"Have you seen her recently?" he asks me. "She looks like she belongs in the torture section of a World War 2 museum. Bandaged arms, skin and bones. _Do you want her to remember that?_"

I don't expect the answer when it crosses my lips. My voice is soft as I whisper, "No."

Zach looks at me and gives the slightest hint of a smile. "You look better, Baxter. More… _you_."

Smirking, I ask, "Who'd I look like before? Oprah?"

I'm not hanging on his every word anymore. I'm staring directly into his eyes now and I can hold his gaze. When he laughs I don't cringe and walk away. I just laugh back and smile when he smiles. Not mimicking him to appear natural, but a true, genuine smile.

"Well," he winks, "I wasn't going to say anything, but…"

I smack him on the arm with an exclamation of, "Damn you, Goode!"

He grabs my arm and twists it behind my back, then pulling me down to sit on the desk next to him. As an afterthought, he takes his grip off of my and puts his hands in his lap, absentmindedly.

"So, were you right?" he asks with a raised eyebrow.

"Huh?" I respond.

Zach's eyes skirt mine, staring intently at the floor. "About it getting easier. Were you right?" he asks again, sitting back on the desk in the row across from me and crossing his arms. "I mean, you look better. The dark circles under your eyes are gone and you started eating normally again."

I knew it was coming. It was only a matter of time before it was asked. The million dollar question: Am I still in love with Zachary Goode?

I honestly haven't thought about it since that day in the hallway. It's been fifteen days since then. My heart hammers in my chest as I try to figure out the answer.

My eyes glance over Zach. His strong, muscular figure, Gallagher uniform, and emerald eyes. My breath doesn't hitch the way it used to. I don't want to kiss him. Not recently.

I think of the days we've talked, unsure of how I managed to sit next to him and just… _talk._ Our stress reliever has changed. We don't kiss, we don't sleep, we just talk.

He runs a hand through his dark hair and a worried expression crosses his face. He's trying to read the answer from me and he must not like what he's getting. Does he know what I'm going to say? Does he think I'm going to say something different?

Cautiously, I let myself think of the summer. We'd hit rock bottom. We'd…

Excuses can be made for anything. I cannot rely on my human reason. It will lie to me, take Cammie's heart, burn it, trample it, and provide a good reason for it. Human reasoning is not to be trusted. We are corrupt and evil in our most primal consciousness.

This decision must be objective, not subjective.

So I search through my physical reactions to Zach's presence. There are goose-bumps on my arms, but I think that's from the cold. My heart has slowed down, but my adrenaline is high. My breathing is even. My leg is shaking from the adrenaline.

I wish I had a mirror to see if my eyes are dilated.

But what surprises me most, is that when I search my emotional responses, I find nothing.

And it's beautiful.

"Yes," I tell him, breathing a sigh of relief. "It did get better."

Zach smiles at me and my heart doesn't skip a beat. He hugs me and butterflies don't form in my stomach. I wrap my arms around him, but not for support. I don't need him there anymore.

Would it be too cliché for me to say he's like my best friend? Would it be too gross to say it was like hugging me brother considering the amount I kissed him?

Probably. So, in my mind, he'll always be Zach. The exception to all of my rules. My crutch when I was weak. My shoulder to cry on. But never my lips to kiss. Not anymore.

I smile because I realize that I'm okay with that. I pull away and grin at him. "Nothing." I say, relieved to feel just that. "Absolutely nothing."

Zach smirks, and while I still find it unbelievably sexy, I realize that I find it sexy in a different way now. It's sexy in a _my-older-brother's-a-hotshot-but-I'll-never-admit-it _way.

"Baxter," Zach laughs gently, giving a small shake of his head. "You're an emotional roller coaster."

I'm not in love with Zachary Goode. And that is the best news I've heard in a long time.

"Teenage girls generally come with the territory of being emotional roller coasters, Goode." I snap, but then grin. "I really don't get what men see in us."

"Ooh," Zach smiles, "You couldn't have me so you switched teams, eh?"

Laughing, I joke, "Dammit, Goode, you found me out."

I think that maybe I can face Cammie now. I don't have to have my walls up and keep my distance. There are no secrets within me anymore.

"Hey," he raises his hands defensively, as if I might hit him. "Just keep your hands off Cammie… Wait—that could potentially be kind of hot as long as I can—"

I bring my elbow into his side. "You wish, man. I don't swing that way."

He nods, nonchalantly. "So if it's not Cammie, then who is it? I can see you and Mace—"

"I'm not gay!" I promise with a laugh.

He leans in close to my face and stares me straight in the eyes. "You know what they say: Denial is the first stage…"

"You suck!" I giggle.

"No I don't. I don't swing that way either." Zach says.

Smiling, Zach and I leave the classroom we'd been sitting in and walk to the Dinner Hall. We take our normal seats and we laugh at jokes that are thrown around.

Maybe one day I'll tell Cammie about what happened between Zach and I, but not today. Tonight I celebrate. I plan to treat myself to whatever I want, because now, I can have what I want and not feel guilty.

I don't want Zach. Yeah, maybe if Cammie hadn't claimed territory first, I might've, but she did. And so I relinquish him safely to her side.

A place in which he will stay as long as she wants him to or I will perform a perfect Klemzich Maneuver on his ass. _Sleep with one eye open, Zach, _I think to myself as I bite into a roll, _because if you pull that crap again, you'll have to deal with me and Macey's water boarding techniques._

He seems to get that from the narrowed eyed glare I shoot at him and he nods.

_Yes ma'am. _His smirk says.


End file.
